Persian salad
We don’t think about putting herbs into salads, except as an afterthought. But, in the Middle East, they can be the salad. And this one is beautiful, though it depends on top quality leaves and flowers as well as herbs. I like the flowers to be all blue and white, that way it has the same colour palette, but see what you can get. Obviously, the flowers need to be unsprayed. Even some supermarkets seem to be doing various colours of radish – purple and mauve as well as pink – but, again, see what you can find; just use pink and it will still look gorgeous, as long as everything is absolutely perky and fresh.
Ingredients
For The Salad
- 12 radishes different colours if you can get them
- ½ ridge cucumber use ½ regular cucumber if you can’t find that
- 75 g 2¾oz salad leaves (baby spinach, watercress, lamb’s lettuce and any red-veined leaves you can find)
- 20 g ¾oz dill fronds
- 25 g 1oz mint leaves
- 15 g ½oz basil leaves
- 15 g ½oz flat-leaf parsley leaves
- edible flowers and petals
For The Dressing
- 4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tbsp white balsamic vinegar
- good squeeze of lemon
- salt and pepper
Instructions
- If the radishes have really fresh leaves, remove them, wash and pat dry.
- They can go into the salad, too.
- Either quarter or shave the radishes, whichever you think will look best.
- Peel the cucumber, remove the seeds and cut the flesh into chunks.
- Mix all the dressing ingredients together and season well.
- Toss all the elements together and serve.
